I finally fulfilled a long-time dream! I went to the Field Museum in Chicago and saw Sue, the largest and most complete T. rex found to date! Chicago is only a few hours from Indianapolis, so there is no reason it has taken me this long to visit. A dear friend recently got married in Chicago, so we took the opportunity to stop in using our Indiana State Museum membership to get in free.

Sue!

My highest priority on this visit was to see Sue! She is the first, beautiful thing you see when you walk in. I fangirled pretty hard.

I’ve been dreaming of getting this picture for years. Literally. Years. I knew I was going to pretend to run away from Sue years before I saw her. #DreamBig I practiced this pose last year with a dinosaur in North Carolina.

Since we didn’t have to pay admission, we splurged on tickets for a 3D movie about Sue. We learned that Sue was 28 years old when she died. In the video, a researcher showed a slice of her bone under a microscope. You could clearly see growth lines similar to rings of a tree. The earlier lines were farther apart due to her rapid growth through her teen years. Later lines, about a decades worth, were much closer together, almost on top of each other, showing that she had spent almost ten years as a full grown adult. We also learned that Sue had many injuries, infections, and even arthritis. This old lady has a lot going on.

Mr. Born to Science standing next to Sue’s skull. He wouldn’t be much more than a fun sized candy bar to her. Nom nom nom.

T. rex skulls are big and heavy, usually too heavy to mount with the rest of the bones. The skull in the atrium with the rest of the body is a lighter cast. Her real skull is in a case on the 2nd floor, which is cool because then you can get great pictures like this.

Ancient Egypt

The Field Museum had a number of cultural exhibits that looked really interesting, but unfortunately we only had time to check out one – Inside Ancient Egypt. We entered the exhibit from the main level through a recreation of a tomb. Once downstairs, we saw cool artifacts, an ancient Egyptian boat, and many mummies – the brochure says there over 20 on display!

Mummies were often buried with amulets wrapped within their bandages. In this display, many such amulets are arranged in front of one of the museum’s mummies, Harwa, showing where each might have been placed.

Mini diorama of the mummification process

Evolving Planet

My very favorite exhibit was easily Evolving Planet! I asked my humanities-loving husband, and he agreed. This exhibit starts with the beginning of life on earth and gradually brings us up to the present, highlighting awesome fossils and stories along the way. We easily spent half of all of our time at the Field Museum in this exhibit.

Simple single cell bacteria were the first life on Earth. These organisms reproduced by making identical copies of themselves. A major step in evolution occurred when one cell looked at another cell…

…And evidently, liked what it saw. Giggity. The two “cells” at the top of this sign struck my funny bone. “How you doin’?”

As organisms continued bumpin’ bits, they evolved much more quickly and got increasingly more complicated. For instance, the museum had a lot of cool synapsids – the early creatures that would eventually evolve to become mammals.

Looking back at my great great great great (etc.) grandma on the Gascho side. You can tell because of the nose. That’s a classic Gascho nose. Synapsids originated about 312 million years ago.

Dimetrodon, 295-272 million years ago

Dimetrodon is one of the most popular synapsids. The Mr. said it used to be his favorite “disnosaur” when he was little, and he was heartbroken when he learned it wasn’t a dinosaur. I think many kids had the same experience.

Eventually synapsids gave rise to mammals and mammals gave rise to hominids (relatives to modern humans). The Field Museum has a cast of the famous Lucy skeleton on display! Lucy is a very early hominid, is about 3.2 million years old, and is remarkably complete for her age.

Lucy, Australopithecus, 3.2 million years ago

It was very cool to stand next to Lucy and get a sense of how similar yet different we are.

One of my favorite displays in the hominid exhibit was this 15,000 year old homo sapiens woman.

Evidence of burial in Homo sapiens, 15,000 years ago.

Not only is she the earliest known complete homo sapiens skeleton, she is also a rare example of early burial practices. Many clues including the location and positioning of the body indicate that a grave was created for this individual. This means that early humans such as her understood and valued the difference between life and death.

Basically, the Evolving Planet exhibit was awesome!

A large, curved wall at the Evolving Planet exhibit exit featuring a quote from Charles Darwin: “…from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.” (Click to enlarge)

Dinosaur Hall

Nestled in the center of the Evolving Planet exhibit is the Dinosaur Hall. (See? I told you it was the best.) The Dinosaur Hall is in between the synapids and the hominids.

Again, there were a lot of cool things to check out in the Dinosaur Hall. In general, I was a little overwhelmed with everything I wanted to see! If I had an infinite amount of time, I would have taken a whole day to check out the Evolving Planet exhibit and come back on a second day to see the rest of the museum. Guess it’s time to schedule a second trip!

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